Pundits’ predictions of Senator Elizabeth Warren’s political demise, so frequently heard over the past year, have proved not only premature but dead wrong. Prognosticators declared her presidential candidacy dead on arrival even before her introductory campaign video intended to explain her Native American ancestry was widely panned as the political equivalent of the Hindenburg disaster.

Warren has been belittled as Hillary Clinton-Redux, a shrill – read: female – Ivy League liberal certain to trigger the same misogyny that made Clinton Kryptonite to too many Americans. Her soak-the-rich policies have been derided as the worst of both worlds – not socialist enough to dislodge Senator Bernie Sanders’ lock on the left-most quadrant of the Democratic party but too threatening to moderate Democrats to gain traction in the party’s middle.

But five months before the Democratic nominating contests begin in Iowa next February, Warren is the Democratic candidate with momentum. She has raised massive amounts of campaign money, and her fundraising trajectory is decidedly upward: $6 million in contributions in the first quarter of 2019 grew to over $19 million in the second, more than Sanders.

Warren’s second quarter haul was delivered by a whopping 384,000 individuals. Her surging poll numbers both nationally and in key states and the eye-popping crowds she has been drawing all but guarantee that her fundraising performance in the third quarter is going to be more impressive still.

Those poll numbers of hers are getting more and more difficult to ignore, as Warren has increasingly overtaken Sanders for second place in many surveys, and appears poised to take advantage of the strong organizations her campaign has built in the early states and overtake Biden in three of the first four contests – Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada.

Of eight national polls taken over the past 10 days, five have Warren in second, and a sixth has her tied with Bernie Sanders. Last Wednesday’s Economist/YouGov poll found Joe Biden leading with 26%, Warren only four points behind with 22% – and Sanders with only 14%. An IBD/TIPP poll taken the previous day found Biden at 28%, Warren again only four points back at 24% – and Sanders with only half of Warren’s support, at 12%.

As in the national polls, key state polls show that Warren is gaining on Biden and leaving Sanders behind. The Real Clear Politics average of polls of potential Democratic Iowa caucus-goers found 28% supported Biden, and Warren slightly ahead of Sanders with 18%.

In New Hampshire, a state in which Sanders won 60% of Democratic primary voters in 2016, this past Sunday’s CBS poll found Warren narrowly leading, with 27% to Biden’s 26% and Sanders’ 25%. The most recent Nevada poll showed Warren steadily climbing, with 18%, up from 12% in July and 15% in August.

The same phenomenon – Warren nipping at the former Vice President’s heels and surpassing Sanders – is apparent in other states as well. A new Boston Globe/Suffolk University poll released this past weekend showed 24% of Massachusetts voters supporting Warren, only two points behind Biden.

This is a 14 point bounce for her since June. And Sanders’ grip on progressives in the nation’s bluest state is slipping, with only 8% of Massachusetts Democrats supporting him. In delegate-rich California, the most recent polling shows Warren at 21%, only four percentage points behind Biden, ahead of Sanders and California Senator Kamala Harris.

The signs seem clear. Warren is emerging as Biden’s principal competitor, and she is poised to eclipse him if the front runner falters.

And history shows that precisely what Democratic front runners do is falter. Front runners Dick Gephardt (1988), Howard Dean (2004) and Hillary Clinton (2008) all saw their candidacies evaporate in Iowa or shortly thereafter. Her growing popularity among Democrats, the enthusiasm of her supporters, the strength of her organization and her fundraising success have all combined to give Warren a very real ticket to ride to the Democratic presidential nomination.

Jeff Robbins is a Boston lawyer and former U.S. delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Commission